When it comes to hit singles, Jubin Nautiyal’s back catalogue is fully loaded. But when it comes to albums it’s a different story, as the singer, songwriter and popular Hindi film playback vocalist has never made a full-length non-film record in his decade-long career. Until now. With Tum Aaye Ho Toh, the smooth-voiced serenader has finally created the album he’s always wanted to make. Made in collaboration with lyricist Rocky Khanna—with whom he scored the 2018 smash “Humnava Mere”—this record, released at the end of 2023, is a chronicle of love for the ages. Welcome to six silky songs that depict the rush of romance, the sorrow of separation and the pathos of ever-present but unrequited feelings. “I’m not like a [perpetually] sad or heartbroken guy,” Nautiyal says when asked by Apple Music about why he so frequently gives voice to lovelorn souls, “but I don’t know—I think destiny has something else for me.” Khanna and Nautiyal were encouraged to embark on Tum Aaye Ho Toh after reflecting on the enduring success of “Humnava Mere”—despite that track being at least a minute-and-a-half longer than the average pop song. “It’s one of the songs that made me believe that, at the end of the day, it’s just good content that matters,” Nautiyal says. “That’s when the thought of an album came into my head.” The duo had a bank of more than 50 tunes from which they finalised the record’s six tracks. And from the outset, the singer was clear that he wanted the same set of musicians and technicians across all the songs. “Today, there’s the concept of making an album with five composers and five writers, but we wanted a uniformity in the sound,” says Nautiyal, who worked with members of his live band—guitarists Prachotosh ‘Appai’ Bhowmick and Aditya Shankar Benia, bassist Raj Kumar Dewan and drummer Souvik Roy—as well as sound engineer Shadab Rayeen on the effort that was produced by Khanna’s teenage son Abraham. It’s classic Jubin but with a freshness in the approach. There are power ballads, for sure, but there are also subtler shades of the vocalist in each song. Here, he takes us through the making of each track. Aisi Teri Yaadein “We wanted to do a song that celebrates sadness. It doesn’t feel like a very sad song [but] there’s melancholy in it. [It’s about that] one person who’s always there in your head. Somebody you could not end up with, who it did not work with, but they’re so special to you that if they were to come in front of you, even when you’re 80 years old, you will probably meet them like you were 20 again. You have accepted the fact that you can’t be together but the bond you had is still worth celebrating because at least you felt it. The inspiration was the mountains; ‘Aisi Teri Yaadein’ was born years ago in the Nubra Valley in Ladakh, in minus 13 degrees Celsius temperature. Rocky, me and our team were sitting next to a fire. That’s when we started working on it.” Humko Tumse Pyaar “After the success of ‘Humnava Mere’, Rocky and I knew that we had made a cult song, but we didn’t know how to make such a song again. We were trying to make an even better one but it just wasn’t happening. The moment we left that thought, the melody of ‘Humko Tumse Pyaar’ came to us. It was fresh but at the same time it was so much in the palette of—and had been so solidly influenced by—the [kind of] ghazals that we’d been hearing. My parents love this song the most.” Udta Udta “With this song, [we aim to capture that feeling] when you’ve just fallen in love for the first time at 17 to 18 years old. It’s like [our version of] ‘Pehla Nasha’ [the classic romantic ballad from 1992 Hindi film Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikandar]. Songs like ‘Tum Aaye Ho To’ and ‘Aisi Teri Yaadein’ were recorded in one take. On the other hand, when I started recording ‘Udta Udta’, it was done in a kind of low [register] and Rocky was like, ‘You should push it a little high.’ We belted it out further and further until we reached a place where my voice couldn’t go higher. That’s where we locked it.” Tum Aaye Ho Toh “At the start of my career, I met Bhatt saab [‘sir’ in Hindi] who asked me to share some of my music with him. I sent him a few songs that I thought matched his taste. Then he asked me to send something that I wished for him to hear—not for a film or anything. That’s when Rocky and I made this; he loved it. The song has lived with us for a long time. The beauty of it is that it’s very romantic but at the same time there’s so much melancholy in it. This the most unusual sounding song on the entire album. It’s very blues-inspired. I love the blues.” Meri Sau “This is a song through which a guy is trying to pacify his girl after she gets upset with him. There’s a lot of playfulness in it. ‘Meri Sau’ has a very earthy, folk-driven, pahadi [colloquial description of life in rural mountainous regions] melody to which we’ve given a little new-age production. The lyrics could be interpreted as sad but they’re not. The song has a happy vibe.” Kahaani Teri Meri “There’s a certain madness in a lover that [filmmaker] Mahesh Bhatt portrays very well in his movies. [We’ve attempted to show] that madness in a song. It’s a story of unrequited love that’s been going on forever, [with lyrics like] ‘even if I die, I’ll still love you’. We could have done it in a lot of ways, but rock guitars and heavy beats were the best way to express the emotions of a passionate lover. This is the rock anthem of the album.”